


Kneel before Your King

by mustehelmi



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Abuse of Authority, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Canon Era, Evil Uther Pendragon (Merlin), Fate & Destiny, Hopeful Ending, Hurt Merlin (Merlin), Kneeling, M/M, Manhandling, One Shot, Pre-Relationship, Prisoner Merlin, Public Humiliation, Soul Bond, Weird flirting, Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-03
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:55:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26791012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mustehelmi/pseuds/mustehelmi
Summary: After Morgana’s betrayal, Uther becomes unhinged, seeing magic where there isn’t and imprisoning innocents left and right for being sorcerers. One of the prisoners refuses to kneel before him, claiming that he only serves one King. Namely, King Arthur.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 230
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Kneel before Your King

**Author's Note:**

> Major whumptober prompts used:  
> Day 3 - Manhandling & Forced to kneel | Day 11 - Defiance
> 
> Minor whumptober prompts used:  
> Day 1 - Shackled & Hanging 
> 
> Some triggers could be Uther's abuse of power, starvation, mistreatment of vulnerable people such as children and the elderly, and description of the aftermath of abuse and violence (this includes the death of minor OCs).

Spending time away from Camelot has put magic and its users into perspective for Arthur. He thinks it an improvement to have gained insight on the one topic his father refuses to discuss rationally or in length. For all Arthur’s life, magic has been bad and its users corrupted and dangerous. He’s attended countless executions since his ninth birthday and some of his most traumatizing childhood memories are of witches burning on pyres and sorcerers’ heads rolling down the cobblestones, leaving red trails where they go.

But in other kingdoms, things are different. Of course, Arthur has always known this, but he’s never truly experienced it, simply accepted it as an abstract fact. After Morgana’s betrayal, Arthur and Uther clashing together and Uther sending Arthur away on a diplomatic mission to reaffirm their alliances, Arthur realizes his father’s approach is not the only or even the best one to truly keep peace in the kingdom.

To his horror, Arthur finds that Uther’s obsession with controlling magic (killing sorcerers) has become worse during his absence. His father is practically frothing at the mouth as he strides back and forth in the throne room and his knuckles are white with the force he clenches his fists when he preaches about how magic will doom the whole world to never-ending misery. Everything bad, painful and evil has sprung from magic and is wielded by magic users on normal people.

“It spreads like a disease,” Uther explains, his voice booming around the room. “It infected my ward. Lady Morgana, her beautiful soul . . . She was like a daughter to me. The magic soaked into her bones, blackened her heart. She was good, until magic touched her and now she is beyond redemption. If there was anything I could do to drive it out of her . . .” Uther’s voice falters, his eyes glazing over as he stares unseeingly at the ceiling for a moment, until he starts out of it, his voice rising in volume. “But there is no cure for magic. She is lost and no lady anymore. Magic has claimed her and our kingdom has suffered a great loss, but we must fight on. I swear on my soul, I will not rest until all magic has been purged from this world. Before every last drop of sorcerer blood has been drained, no one is safe. No one!”

Uther’s voice climbs into a scream. Many of the women in the room and some men recoil from their king, but Uther doesn’t notice, lost in his own preaching. “All magic must die. I will avenge my ward and every other citizen who has ever been wronged by magic. This will be my legacy.”

Arthur stands at the front of the room, stone-faced, his knights around him. It’s his first day back in Camelot after visiting Princess Mithian and her father, King Rodor, in Nemeth, who were the last stop on his diplomatic nonsense mission. Uther had been slowly unraveling over the years - Arthur had been forced to accept it after the episodes of obvious madness he'd had after Morgana's unexpected attempt to assassinate both him and Arthur to get to the throne herself. Before that last straw, Arthur had been able to avert his gaze and follow his father’s word blindly, but this . . . this is on another level. Uther is beyond reason and it’s painful to watch without being able to do anything about it, lest a word against him would be taken as a challenge and Arthur was sent away again. As the Crown Prince he has a duty to his people, and even though Uther still sits on the throne, it’s clear Camelot needs Arthur to act as a buffer between his father and the people before the King decides to burn them all.

Once Uther is done yelling at the court, he takes Arthur to see the prisoners. The King marches first with his heir a step behind him. A few knights follow, Leon among them. He and Arthur exchange looks in passing – they’ve both been gone for months and the whole of Camelot is hardly recognizable anymore.

The commoners scurry around the streets with their heads down, the servants sneak around the castle corridors holding their breaths, the nobles keep to themselves and the guards are on high-alert. At first glance Camelot appears haunted, the ghosts driving the living away. But the prison, it’s packed with people. Every cell, full of them; children, elderly, women and men, commoners and nobles. Some are covered in blood and bruises, others have little to no clothes and many cough and snivel, deeply ill. It’s obvious who has been down longer and who is a new arrival at the cells. One elderly man is but skin and bones where he lies slumped on the floor, his shallow breaths wet, only blood-stained smallclothes covering his shivering form. Two commoner girls, twins, too young to help on the fields yet, are shackled to each other by their ankles. One has had her hair cut off with dull scissors and the other’s arm is bandaged with a scrap of silk. 

“I found these shackles in the vault, they have runes engraved in them to suppress the magic of any sorcerer wearing them. Every blacksmith around is making more of them as we speak and I have some of the more compliant prisoners enchanting them. As long as they obey me, they’ll be the last sorcerers I’ll see executed.”

Arthur is about to retch. Behind him, Leon’s face glows pale.

A guard runs up to Uther. “Excuse me, sire, I don’t wish to disturb, but a new batch of sorcerers have been brought in.”

Uther shines up, his eyes glittering in the torchlight, a wide grin spreading on his face. “Fantastic,” he says and Arthur has to swallow his nausea.

“Come,” Uther commands and leads the way through the dungeons to the courtyard at a brisk pace, up to where two cages on wheels wait for them.

Arthur counts eight prisoners, four in each cage. The guards load them out by pulling at the heavy, engraved shackles around their wrists. They’re lined up for an inspection by their King.

Two girls, four women, one of which is elderly, and two young men. Some have ripped clothes, and all look dirty, like they’ve each rolled around in the mud wrestling wild boars. Arthur spies bruises beneath the filth.

“Kneel before your king,” the guard before them says and shoves one of the women. She falls in a heap under his force and the others hurry to follow her lead.

All but one.

One of the two men stay standing. He favors his left leg, a red neckerchief tied around his hurt ankle – no shoes, Arthur notes. His wrists are bloodied under the shackles, his hair a wild mop of dark curls dipped in now dried mud. What strikes Arthur is his eyes: they’re blue and the gaze in them heated and cold at the same time.

Uther hums, the sound vibrating ominously in the silence following the man’s defiance.

“We found this one on our way back in, suspiciously loitering in the forest just outside, sire,” the guard explains. “Quite the firecracker.”

“What is his crime?” Arthur asks, his eyes never leaving the man. He’s quite beautiful in his own way, underneath all that filth and hurt. Slender, with high cheekbones and ears that stick out. And no one could deny his spirit.

“He’s a sorcerer.”

“But how can you be sure-”

“Enough!” Uther glares at the guard, then at Arthur. “This man’s tainted by magic and I know it, there’s no need for further proof! Make the scum show his betters some respect.”

The guard snaps to action. “Yes, sire.”

With one large hand, the guard grabs the young man’s hair and kicks him behind his knees. The man’s legs buckle and he crashes to the ground, though his head is held up by the guard, his neck awkwardly bent in the hold.

“My mission is to rid this world of magic, which I find you all guilty of, and therefore you are to be executed. The more you resist, the more painful your ending will be. Death has always been your destiny.”

“Death has never been my destiny,” the young man squirming in the guard’s hold hisses.

Uther laughs, the mere sound a promise of pain. “Your king says otherwise.”

“I only serve one king.” The man gasps when the guard knees him between his shoulder blades, but refuses to stay silent. “Where is your son . . . your son, Arthur?”

Uther freezes in place and Arthur holds his breath. Dressed in chainmail and with a sword at his hip, he looks like any other knight. Either the young man hasn’t noticed him yet or he doesn’t know what the Crown Prince looks like.

“What do you want with my son?” Uther says in a low voice. He almost sounds calm, but Arthur knows, he knows this is just a countdown to the explosion.

“I only serve your son, King Arthur-”

Uther loses it, crying out in hysterics and advances on the man, who must be out of his mind. Why would he say such things, when it’s clear the King is completely unhinged? “I said, what do you want with my son, you scum?!”

He kicks the man, who is still forced to kneel. Though now rather than holding him down, the guard is holding him up for Uther to maul. Uther pants like a rabid animal and the defiant man whimpers and groans under the assault.

Arthur can’t stand by and watch, he must act, consequences be damned. Together with Leon, they pull Uther back, but the King shakes them off in rage. He yells orders for the guards to stash the prisoners with the others and make sure the sorcerer who dared to threaten the royal family suffers.

“It was him, it was him,” Uther hisses. He grabs Arthur’s shoulders, squeezes him like a doll between his hands, spit flying from his lips. “It was him who took Morgana and now he’s coming for you.”

Afterwards, Arthur excuses himself, pretending to supervise the guards moving the prisoners down to the jam-packed cells. When he’s alone he runs behind the corner and retches until he dry heaves, his head full of images of festering wounds, sunken eyes, pyres, executions and his father’s face twisted beyond recognition in sick joy. He sinks to the ground, uncaring that his knees land in his own vomit, too dizzy to stand on his own.

Uther can’t remain on the throne.

After dinner with his father, who talks about nothing but the young man who corrupted Morgana and his plans to revenge torture him, Arthur sneaks down to the cells, pretending to check up on the prisoners on Uther’s behalf.

With a torch in his hand and his sword on his hip, Arthur walks deeper into the dungeon. There are more cells than he could’ve imagined, the caves reaching deep underground in dwindling corridors.

Down there, it stinks of death, sickness and misery. The prisoners are moaning and begging, some of him, some of the gods to be allowed to die or escape, depending on what shape they are in. There are rotting corpses in some cells. Many cry in desperation and denial, others stare vacantly into the darkness.

Arthur can’t stop for the fear of crumbling in place, can’t say anything to console or encourage, but he forces himself to look at the people sitting in the cells. His people, who he is to protect. How many of these prisoners are truly magic users? How many of them have ever even seen magic with their own eyes, let alone used it themselves? Too few of them, maybe none.

The young man with the red neckerchief around his left ankle is alone. His arms are chained wide apart and too high up on the wall for him to comfortably sit on his bum. Instead he crouches in a half kneeling position, while attempting to stretch his left leg in front of him. An enormous bruise is blooming on the left side of his face.

“Already back?” the man mumbles, his eyes closed and head rolled back to lean against the wall, resignation clear on his face.

Arthur doesn’t know what to say, so he opts for silence while he takes the key off the wall hook and opens the cell door.

Well inside, he crouches before the man, drinking in his facial features in the flickering torchlight. Once again, Arthur notes that the man is pretty and his heart speeds up the longer he looks. For some reason this man feels important to Arthur even though they’re strangers.

“In the courtyard, you said you only serve one king.” Arthur licks his lips. “Who is it?”

“King Arthur,” the man replies without hesitation. “Doesn’t matter how much you’ll beat me, it’ll never change.”

“I won’t beat you.”

The man chuckles and groans. “What’ll you do to me then?”

“Nothing. I’m Prince Arthur.”

At that, the man’s eyes blink open and he searches Arthur’s face for three tense heartbeats. The ghost of a smile graces his lips.

“It’s you,” he whispers.

“It’s me,” Arthur agrees. “What’s your name?”

“Merlin,” Merlin says, his voice still soft. “I’m sorry I’m so late.”

“Late?”

“So late to come. You’re my destiny, but every time I’ve set off to find you, something else has popped up. The latest was a baby dragon. They’re tough to raise.”

Arthur’s jaw hangs open. “A dragon?”

As if he hasn’t just delivered the most unlikely excuse for being late (late for what? Arthur has no idea), no explanation is forthcoming and Merlin’s eyes turn apologetic. “Sorry it took so long. And sorry about your father. I know you love him.”

Arthur’s head spins. “We don’t know each other.”

“ _You_ don’t know _me,_ ” Merlin corrects with a slightly stronger smile than before. “But you will soon. I know you have no reason to trust me, but I promise, I only want what’s best for you and these lands. You’re my King and destiny. Nothing can ever change that.”

“Why would you apologize for my father?” Arthur asks, because he’s not ready to deal with the destiny talk. “He’s not dead yet.”

“No, but he’ll be soon, and there’s nothing either of us can do about it.” Merlin wiggles in his shackles, crusted blood and mud raining off him where he scrapes against the wall and chains. “If I were you, I’d say my goodbyes now. Tomorrow morning it might be too late.”

Tomorrow morning. Fear and sadness grips Arthur, but at the same time, he can’t ignore the smell of bodily discharge, rot and infection around him or the flashing images of innocent people packed into small, dirty cells, while his father’s crazed laugh plays on a loop in the background.

“Will you kill him?” he asks and Merlin shakes his head.

“I’m stuck down here with these things on my wrists. And even if I weren’t, I wouldn’t do it.”

“Why not? He has done nothing for you.”

“No, but it’d hurt you and I wouldn’t do that on purpose.”

Arthur swallows. There’s a commotion down the hall, a woman crying in a shrill voice and the rough voices of guards giving orders to each other. Shaking his head to clear it, Arthur stands.

“I should go.”

“Yeah.”

“I can’t let you free yet.” He hesitates, but only because he already knows the answer, but has to ask anyway. “You’re of magic, aren’t you, Merlin?”

Merlin chuckles. “Not of, am. I am magic.”

“I have no reason to trust you . . .” Arthur looks over Merlin’s form. His thin, bloodied wrists clasped in shackles, his bruised face, his long, gangly limbs, dirty clothes and hair. Merlin’s eyes are clear and deep and there’s something in there that Arthur knows is his, if only he has the time to search and find it.

He doesn’t have it right now, even though he’d want to. Somehow he just knows that he can trust Merlin, this strange being of magic who associates with dragons, who showed up out of nowhere and pledged his loyalty to Arthur alone.

Merlin’s eyes are kind and sincere. “I know and I won’t hold this against you.”

Further yelled commands echo down the tunnels, mixed in with cries of rage and hurt, the kind wounded mother bears let out when they find their cubs shot dead. Something big is going down between the guards and the prisoners and Arthur should hurry off to see what’s happening. And then he should go see his father. Just in case.

“I have to go.”

Merlin nods and shifts against the wall, trying to find a more comfortable position with his injuries. Arthur’s heart clenches at the sight, but there’s nothing he can do yet, not as long as Uther’s word is law.

“Come get me when you’re King.” Merlin’s words are laced with both pain and humor. “And I’ll see if you’re truly worth kneeling for.”

“I will,” Arthur says and means it, despite the flush creeping up his neck and cheeks. “And I will be. Worth kneeling for, I mean. I’ll do everything in my power to be a decent king.”

“A great king,” Merlin says. 

And in that moment, Arthur feels like no one’s ever put more belief in him.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this fic, please leave me feedback! I post stories because part of the fanfic experience for me is to interact with my readers. If I didn't want to hear from you, I'd put my stuff on a memory stick and leave it on a shelf
> 
> I thank my lovely friend Robyn for beta'ing this for me ♥
> 
> I'm [sweetsoursugarcube](https://sweetsoursugarcube.tumblr.com/) on tumblr if you want to reach out to me or keep up with my writing. I feel like there might be more merthur on the way


End file.
